The Pilot

Despite pilot Roger Peterson being a young married man who built his life around flying, he had failed his instrument rating checkride nine months prior to the accident. He held a waiver to his second-class medical certificate for a hearing deficiency, although this almost certainly was not a factor in the accident. Most significantly, he had taken instrument training in an aircraft with a different type of attitude indicator than the one in the Bonanza. It provided a direct movement of the airplane on the face of the instrument, similar to todays modern steam-gauge attitude indicators, but opposite that of the then more-prevalent war-surplus attitude indicators in which the airplane stayed constant in the instrument while the artificial horizon moved instead.

Key Takeaways:

• Pilot Roger Peterson was not qualified for IFR flight, having failed his instrument rating checkride nine months prior to the accident.
• He was unfamiliar with the attitude indicator in the accident aircraft, as it operated differently from the type he had trained on.
• This lack of qualification for IFR flight in IMC conditions, combined with instrumentation unfamiliarity, created significant risk.

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